Gilles Bernier (Quebec politician)

Gilles Bernier

Gilles Bernier, MP (born July 15, 1934 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada) is a former Canadian politician and diplomat. He was the Member of Parliament representing the riding of Beauce from 1984 to 1997 initially as a Progressive Conservative and later as an Independent and Canada's ambassador to Haiti from 1997 to 2001.

A native of Montreal, Bernier moved to the Beauce in 1953 [1]to pursue a radio career at CKRB radio station in St-Georges-de-Beauce and quickly became a local celebrity. Capitalizing on his popularity, he decided to go into politics with Brian Mulroney and the Progressive Conservative in the 1984 election. He served two terms as a Tory but was forced to run as an independent in the 1993 election after Kim Campbell barred him from running under the PC banner due to fraud charges from which he was later acquitted. In 1997 Jean Chrétien named him ambassador to Haiti which made his riding up for grabs for Liberal candidate Claude Drouin in the 1997 election.

Bernier's son, Maxime Bernier, won the riding in turn from Drouin in the 2006 federal election, as a candidate of the merged Conservative Party of Canada. Maxime Bernier would serve as Minister of Industry and Minister of Foreign Affairs before resigning from the cabinet amid scandal in 2008.

Official Voting Results

General Election (September 4, 1984)

Beauce (Quebec)

Candidate	Party	Number of Votes
Gilles Bernier	Progressive Conservative	25,028
Normand Lapointe	Liberal Party of Canada	20,323
Serge L'Italien	New Democratic Party	1,217
Paul-Emile Grondin	Parti Nationaliste du Québec	569

Official Voting Results

General Election (November 21, 1988)

Beauce (Quebec)

Official Voting Results

General Election (October 25, 1993)

Beauce (Quebec)